Lincoln City Hall changes: New part time person to be hired for City Clerk's office
Privacy wall to be built in the former zoning office

 

[August 21, 2018] 

LINCOLN 

On Monday evening, Lincoln aldermen agreed to hire a new part time person to work at City Hall in the City Clerk’s Office

The decision came after discussions over recent weeks concerning the work load at the City Clerk’s Office since switching sewerage billing from quarterly to monthly.

The change to monthly billing in essence tripled the daily work load of the staff. City Clerk Peggy Bateman said that all the staff was on overload and they were not keeping up. They need more help so that they can do their daily duties and still provide customer service at the window in city hall.

She explained that with the monthly billing going from 1,700 customers to over 5,000, there are lots of people coming to city hall to pay their bills. They have to wait for service, and when then get to the window they sometimes have issues they wish to discuss or just complaints they want to air. Bateman said that staff has to deal with that, and be courteous and attentive to the needs of the customer, but that it causes additional delays.

She noted for example, one customer who is a landlord who comes in to pay all of his/her bills at once. She said this month, that one person required almost an hour of attention from the staff, while others had to wait.

Last week on Tuesday evening, alderman discussed how to address the issue. Should they hire a part time person who might go to full time, or should they hire a full-time temporary who could then be taken down to part time.

Bateman and other members of the council felt it would be difficult to find someone who would take a full time position with the knowledge that it would be taken back to part time in the future.

The aldermen talked about whether or not a new job description would have to be written if they hired an additional full time person. They surmised that they could hire a “sewer clerk II” that would not require a lot of, if any, additional work to put together a job description and create the position.

During the discussion Alderman Ron Fleshman said that he didn’t believe the work load would decrease because, in the near future the city needs to switch its sewerage billing to usage based. That will cause additional prep work for the sewer clerk(s) because the office will have to retrieve water meter readings from Illinois American Water, and will have to calculate individual sewer bills based on the water readings.

The water usage based billing is being put into effect due to the city’s mandate for a Long-term Control plan at the sewerage treatment plant. The multi-million dollar project is being mandated by the State through the Environmental Protection Agency, but does not come with financial assistance for completing the project.

After much discussion, earlier this year the city approved switching to usage based billing for sewer services as the most effective manner to raise the money needed to pay-off long-term loans and still be fair to constituents.

Alderman Tracy Welch asked that it be added to the Monday agenda to define the position and authorize Bateman to hire a second full time staff member.

However, on Monday evening, Welch changed his position and the motion saying that he would move to hire a part time person for the office instead. He said that discussions he had with Bateman in the last week and other developments on the horizon that would be discussed at the next Committee of the Whole meeting had influenced his opinion of what might be needed at city hall.

With the change in the motion, a vote was taken. All eight aldermen were present Monday evening and the motion passed unanimously.

In addition to this change, alderman were also asked to approve building a wall in the former Building and Zoning Office to create two work spaces.

At last week’s Committee of the Whole meeting, Bateman explained that with the additional billing, the city has purchased two folding machines that are currently in the old zoning office, which is now also the office of City Administrator Beth Kavelman. Bateman said that Kavelman had been gracious about having the noisy machines in her work space, but that it allowed no privacy for Kavelman, and it was disruptive when she was talking with guests or on the phone. The wall would be erected at the edge of the door to the lobby, giving Kavelman a private area.

Bids were reviewed and the bid recommended to the council came from Shew’s Home Construction in an amount not to exceed $3,450. Questions were asked about how the work would be done, and the alderman were told that Shew has said he will work during off hours at city hall so as not to be too disruptive to daily operations.

The council also discussed finding a new office space for Kavelman, but they didn’t come up with a space that was workable. It was noted that the old city administrator office on the second floor is now occupied by the fire department, and aldermen didn’t want to change that. In addition, Mayor Seth Goodman said he thought it was good to have Kavelman on the ground floor where visitors could find her easily. He also noted that since her arrival, Kavelman has had an ‘open door’ to all, and he likes that. He also liked having the CA across the hall from his office where that he too had easy access to Kavelman when he is in the office.

On Monday the motion was made by Tracy Welch and seconded by Steve Parrott to approve the bid from Shew’s. During the roll call vote, six aldermen voted ‘yes’ with aldermen Bauer and Dalpoas voting ‘no.’ The motion carried.

[Nila Smith]